Friday Faculty Focus
News and Notes about #BeBCMS-
Week Seven!
That's right: WEEK SEVEN! Can you even believe it? We had a full week of learning and excitement and I mean a FULL week! THANK you to everyone for being on their A game! We had very few coverage situations but scholars were moving and grooving! This was the busiest overall week we have had since school started and I am sure we are all feeling it! I was overwhelmed with emotions at the pep assembly! It was truly a remarkable experience for our scholars and I was deeply moved! Talk about a PROUD PRINCIPAL moment!
Celebrations:
- Ms. Ennis for being honored as Teacher of the Year
- Mr. Scott for organizing and executing the PEPPY Rally!
- Ms. Franks for getting school wide FTE handled!
- Ms. Simons for getting all our snacks and athletics organized this week
- Ms. Shelby and Ms. Crosby for getting the TRIBE SHOP rolling!
- Ms. Sines, Ms. Ferreira, and Ms. Ennis for getting WIN organized and ready to roll
- Ms. George for being our FULL time, ExExExCellent counselor
- Coach Lewis for coming over to our PEP sessions: It means ALOT to our football athletes
#BeBCMS Elite PBIS update!
The PBIS School Store is OPEN with new hours:
Beginning Tuesday: The store will be open T/W/R for ALL grades at Breakfast time.
On Monday and Friday the store will be open at lunch. We will try this new system and see if it works better for us!
Thank you for your continued support as we work to finish out the last five days of September. Scholars of the Month are due Wednesday. August scholars will have their PIZZA party and KONA ICE day on Friday. Stay tuned for those details. We will announce new scholars of the month on Friday as well!
We have five more days of September and our discipline is looking great. Please continue working on building those relationships and investing. We know it's working!
RTI News and Notes (RTI: READY TO IGNITE-- Elite Interventions!)
Please make sure you are attending the RTI Professional Learning on Tuesdays. If there are changes to this schedule, Ms. Sines will contact you.
Think about this: Let's start asking the RIGHT questions when it comes to RTI. These are the questions that should lead our work: emphasis on LEARNING not TEACHING.
What is the fundamental purpose of our school?
Our schools were not built so educators would have a place to work each day, nor do they exist so that our government officials have locations to administer high-stakes standardized tests each spring. If we peel away the various layers of local, state, and federal mandates, the core mission of every school should be to provide every student with the skills and knowledge needed to be a self-sufficient, successful adult. (Every Child, Every Day...sound familiar?)
Ask parents what they want school to provide their child, and it is doubtful the answer would be, "I just want my child to score proficient on state assessments," or "I want my child to master standard 2.2.3 this year." Learning specific academic standards and passing state tests are meaningless if the student does not become an intelligent, responsible adult who possesses the knowledge and quality of character to live a happy, rewarding adult life.
What knowledge and skills will our children need to be successful adults?
Gone are the days when the only skills a child needed to become a successful adult were a desire to work and some "elbow grease." Today's economy is driven by technology, innovation, and service. Because technology and human knowledge are changing at faster and faster rates, the top 10 in-demand jobs today probably didn't exist five or six years ago (Gunderson, Jones, & Scanland, 2004). Our high school graduates will most likely change careers at least four times by the age of 40—not jobs or employers, but careers. Alvin Toffler has been said to have suggested that, because of this acceleration of human knowledge, the definition of illiterate in the 21st century will not be "Can a person read and write?" but rather "Can a person learn, unlearn, and relearn?"
How do we prepare students for jobs that don't exist? How do we teach our students knowledge that we've not yet discovered?
Teaching them comprehension and computation skills will not be enough—they need to be able to analyze, synthesize, evaluate, compare and contrast, and manipulate and apply information. We will erode our children's and world's future by limiting our vision to teaching only the skills and knowledge presented in our state assessments.
What must we do to make learning a reality for every student?
If we took the research on effective teaching and learning and condensed it into a simple formula for learning, it would look like this:
Targeted Instruction + Time = Learning
Because learning styles and instructional needs vary from student to student, we must provide each student with targeted instruction—that is, teaching practices designed to meet his or her individual learning needs. We also know that students don't all learn at the same speed. Some will need more time to learn. That is the purpose of RTI—to systematically provide every student with the additional time and support needed to learn at high levels. #KeepOn
Important Events!
Friday- #FocusFriday, Celebration for Ms. Ennis!
Tuesday- #TerrificTuesday, Faculty Meeting on FLipGRID must be completed by 8:30 AM Tuesday, WIN in AM (school wide schedule change) for Bus Drill RTI Meetings, Softball HOME, Black and RED Spirit day,
Wednesday- #WinWednesday, Innovation Center- Classrooms as assigned, Ms. Raeburn at Principal's Meeting in Morning at BOE
Thursday-#ThankfulThursday, Leadership 7:40, School Board Meeting , Football AWAY, Tennis AWAY
Friday- #FocusFriday, Kona Ice Day, Scholars of the Month August Pizza Party, Scholars of the Month September Announced, Softball Home
Focus on..... Building positive climates to increase ENGAGEMENT
Engaging for a Positive Classroom Climate
We all know that relationships matter!
"Help students forget about anything else in the world except the positive energy and caring relationships inside YOUR classroom.....a positive climate is one of the greatest gifts a teacher can give his or her students, and in a way, this is the opportunity we have to change lives!"
Keep at your goal of giving out 5 scholar or PBIS notes a day! In semester two we are going to focus on Positive Referrals via Educator's Handbook! I can't wait to roll that out!
*resources from Eric Jensen, Engaging Students with Poverty
PRE-order your TRIBE shop spirit gear! See Ms. Shelby and Ms. Crosby for details!
Nuggets and News
- The Innovation Center: Please be on time and be intentional in your learning!
I am VERY proud of the work we are doing in The Innovation Center and we look to have an AWESOME class selection for Quarter Two!
- Supervision: PLEASE make sure you are at your supervision spots on time. If you need to switch, please just let us know! Being at busses in the shade is NOT enough. You must be engaged with scholars: ALL eyes on them!
- Lesson Plans: Make sure data is driving your planning and have your lesson plans uploaded in the Team Drive Folders nad on your clipboards available. AB, KW, and I will begin looking at those as we begin TKES classroom walk thrus. We are looking for ENGAGEMENT of scholars this week!
Here are my look fors:
1. Are the scholars attracted to their work?
2. Do the scholars persist in their work despite obstacles? (GRIT)
3. Do the scholars take visible delight in accomplishing their work?
- Compliance Checks matching lesson plans every Monday!
- Meetings Schedules: Monday: TEAM, Tuesday: RTI, Wednesday: Math ,Thursday: ELA , Friday: Science and Social Studies
- Educator's Handbook- September referral count is at 7 AMAZING ! Keep it up!
- TKES Walk Throughs- Please make sure you have four green checks. Walk Throughs have started! Feedback is focused, intentional, and transformational! That is what makes our scholars grow!
- Sunshine Club: We would like to have 100% participation in our BCMS Sunshine Club! Dues this year will be $20.00 to Shelby and you will get one free "anytime" jeans pass. This is the only we have as a school house to show people we care about them when they go through hardships. We are a family! Please consider this donation.
- United Way kick off is this week. Stay tuned for information from Ms. George
- MAP testing is almost completed-- PLEASE use your Reading MAP RIT Scores for goal setting in WIN time on Monday! If you don't have the latest MAP score yet, explain to students that we will have one soon and use that data for your Reading goal setting. I know there were lots of glitches-don't worry! We will use it for what it is and move on.
- Morning Times: If you have scholars you want to work with in the morning (Tutorial) please write them a pass. It's an AWESOME idea to work with scholars
- Principal's Advisory Council: I will be looking for members for my council. This is an application process. Application pick up is Monday
- ONE more Jeans in September: The Woo Woo Snack Cart will be out next week! Look for it!
- October Jeans Passes begin sale on MONDAY! 10.00 for Friday Jeans: Money to go to United Way Fund!
- "YOU are LATE to school" passes will be on sale at the start of October too! Stay tuned for information!
- Tuesday 9/26 will be BLACK AND RED AND WHITE Spirit DAY for Lady Redskins!
What I'm Reading....
You know I love the Pirate books: hence my favorite emoji......you won't ever find me without my favorite: LEAD Like A Pirate and I love the hashtag #LeadLAP......
I have read them all and I thought it was time to go back and do some REread of Learn Like A Pirate. LearnLAP is all about empowerment...and this needs to be our shift. Empower starts when teachers provide ample opportunities for student LEADERSHIP. "Students lead when they believe the teacher would appreciate their help, not when the teacher is completely in charge." Reflect on your practices: when do you offer these opportunities to your scholars?
I will begin the 365 days of Wonder Precepts on Monday. I am VERY excited to launch that into our daily morning announcements! Here's a sneak peek:
I gave out three copies of the book WONDER to three ELITE scholars. Colton Gunter, Leslie Schultz, and Myziah Boyd. They will be helping me with the precepts!
What are you reading right now?
L
Tweet....Tweet....Tweet...
This week on Twitter....
Roman Nowak @NowakRo 1h1 hour ago
Be a light. Show strength. Share wisdom. Show LOVE! Kids need it! #bekindEDU #kidsdeserveit #edchat #tlap #engagechat #g2great #LeadLAP #t2t
DSquared Davis @dsquared_bcms 2h2 hours ago
What a week it has been in science!! #causedavissaidso #bebcms #science
liz raeburn @missliz31 Sep 20
liz raeburn Retweeted Tim S. Grover
Tim S. Grover@ATTACKATHLETICS
To reach greatness, you must set unreasonable expectations and expect to achieve them.
You Retweeted
Brian Lawson @coachblawson Sep 18
Culture doesn't change when coach tells a player he's wrong.It changes when players tell other players,"no that's not how we do things here"
Think about lurking on a twitter chat this week! I love #SatChat on Saturday mornings, #WeAreWayne chats on Tuesday nights, and #OhEdChats on Wednesday nights! I learn so much cool stuff!
The FlipGrid code is: see4wce
The topic is: Engagement- What is an ELITE engagement activity you use to get learning ignited? How do you know it's effective?
WIN Period -- Rolling!
- Monday- Set goals, review personal data and school data, grade check-- USE MAP READING data to support school wide Literacy Goal
- Tuesday/Wednesday/Thursday- Remediation/Enrichment: focus on Literacy- Scholars may still need some support knowing where to go. Help them and support them. Remind them this is flexible learning time! :)
- Friday- Clubs or READING time
College Football #FTW
This is the week SSU begins MEAC play and we have our HOME Opener! I am ExExExCited but nervous. If you ever wonder where I sit at football games: I don't. I stand alone somewhere in the corner! Shocking, right! I am excited to see how we play and have my fingers and toes crossed for a win! I am assure you we will look good! FAMU is a great team! They already have a win under their belt. Wish us luck! Sunday is a whole lot better when you wake up a WINNER!
#RTB
Bringing us back to our #RTB how we kicked off our Opening Day!
Key Points:
Never Give Up mantra
1. The Oar- the energy you bring!
2. The Boat- the sacrifice (SERVING AND GIVING!- ALWAYS)
3. The Compass- the direction you go
We ROW! Keep on rowing! Stay the course: #RTB
Still my favorite BCMS football picture!
L